The card comprising a rewritable information recording portion which utilizes the magnetic memory, IC chip, or optical memory has recently spread. Information is written in such a card and read therefrom using a card reader and writer equipped with a recording mechanism of recording the information in the card and a reading mechanism of reading the information recorded in the card. As this kind of card, in particular, a telephone card, a prepaid card, a cash card and the like have widely spread. In the case of any cards, however, the information recorded in the information recording portion can be recognized only through a display portion of a reading apparatus (on the side of the card reader and writer).
Recently attention has been paid to a reversible thermosensitive recording material capable of temporarily carrying out the image formation (recording) thereon and erasing the image therefrom when the image becomes unnecessary, and repeating such recording and erasure. As a representative example, there is known a reversible thermosensitive recording material in which an organic low-molecular-weight material such as a higher fatty acid is dispersed in a matrix resin such as a vinyl chloride resin (Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application 55-154198 and the like).
However, such a conventional reversible thermosensitive recording material (which will hereinafter also be referred to as "a recording material" simply) has the drawback that the surface is rubbed with the application of heat thereto and then scratched while images are formed and erased repeatedly by the application of heat, especially by use of a thermal head. When the occurrence of the scratch becomes serious, images cannot be formed uniformly.
The inventors of the present invention have proposed to provide a protective layer on the surface of the above-mentioned recording material in order to decrease the scratches on the surface caused by the use of the thermal head (Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application 63-221087, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application 63-317385, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application 2-566 and so on). However, it is hard to assert that the provision of the protective layer on the surface of the conventional recording material is quite enough when the recording and erasure are repeated many times.
In addition, the previously mentioned recording material in which the organic low-molecular-weight material is dispersed in the matrix resin has the drawback that when there is employed a heating system of simultaneously applying heat and pressure, such as the thermal head, the particles of the organic low-molecular-weight material tend to aggregate, thereby decreasing the contrast (the degree of milky whiteness) as the number of recording times is increasing.
In fact, such a recording material is put to practical use as a point card (with no information recording portion such as the magnetic memory) on the assumption that it is not repeatedly used so many times. Such a card is used in the following manner so far as the inventors of the present invention know:
Every time a card holder makes a purchase, a mark of .asterisk-pseud. is overwritten successively depending on the point corresponding to a predetermined amount of money. When the predetermined points are saved, the exchange of a commodity equivalent to the predetermined sum of money becomes possible. The card will be subjected to entire erasure when the predetermined points are awarded, and the card can be used again in the above-mentioned manner. However, according to such a manner, the card holder cannot know instantly how many points he has been awarded at present, and in addition, the card cannot be used for other purposes such as transmission of various information because the mark of .asterisk-pseud. is merely overwritten, so that the card is lacking in convenience.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an information and image recording method, with the life of a card which comprises a rewritable information recording portion and an image recording portion comprising a reversible thermosensitive recording material being drastically increased.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an information and image recording method, capable of readily recognizing the information recorded in the image recording portion comprising the reversible thermosensitive recording material.